Chapter 5 - The Flight Over the Dark Lake
The interior of the Coast Guard Sikorsky smelled of aviation fuel, hydraulic fluid, and the sharp, hot ozone of the transport incubator's battery pack.
The roar of the twin turboshaft engines was deafening, vibrating through the steel deck plates, through the soles of my shoes, through the marrow of my bones. Outside the open cargo door’s small bubble window, the world was a black abyss of churning water, the lights of the Chicago shoreline flickering in the distance like dying embers.
Dr. Lin was kneeling on the aluminum floor beside the incubator, her stethoscope pressed to Leo’s tiny abdomen, her eyes fixed on the digital blood-pressure monitor.
"He's dropping," she shouted over the turbine scream, tapping the screen. "Mean arterial pressure is down to thirty-two. The hepatic vein is leaking around the packing. Push ten milliliters per kilo of packed red cells! Hand-pump the infusion—we don't have time for the roller pump!"
A flight nurse hung a small plastic bag of dark crimson blood from the ceiling hook, squeezing the bag between both palms with rhythmic, desperate force.
I sat on the low nylon jump seat, my hands clenched between my knees, my fingernails digging through the fabric of my trousers into the skin of my thighs until I felt the hot sting of blood.
God, I prayed.
I had not prayed in twenty years. I had believed that men who built skyscrapers and commanded corporate boards had no need for altars. I had believed that control was the only god that mattered.
Take the buildings, I whispered into the deafening roar of the rotors, tears freezing on my cheeks in the draft from the cabin seals. Take the investment funds. Take the penthouse on Lake Shore Drive. Strip me down to a ditch digger on a county road. But let this boy take a breath on his own. Let me look his mother in the eye and tell her I didn't let him die.
The helicopter banked violently over the black void of Montrose Harbor, the lights of the skyline suddenly swinging across the windshield in a sickening arc of glass and steel.
Leo’s monitor let out a long, shrill, descending tone.
Heart rate: 64. 58. 52.
"Bradycardia!" Dr. Lin screamed, her hand slapping the emergency release on the incubator lid. "He’s losing cardiac output! Two fingers on the lower third of the sternum! One, two, three, bag! One, two, three, bag!"
The flight nurse began infant chest compressions, using the tips of two fingers to depress the boy's tiny, bruised breastbone half an inch into his chest.
I lunged forward off the jump seat, falling to my knees on the cold aluminum floor, reaching my bare hand into the side port of the incubator.
My fingers brushed against Leo’s foot.
His skin was ice.
"Leo," I begged, my voice lost in the engine roar, but screaming through every cell in my body. "Leo, stay. Look at me, boy. Look at your father. I’m right here. I’m not leaving you. Stay with me!"
Beneath my trembling palm, through the soles of his tiny feet, I felt a faint, microscopic flutter.
The monitor’s tone hitched.
Beep.
Beep... beep.
Heart rate: 78. 86. 104.
"We have sinus rhythm," Dr. Lin gasped, sweat pouring down her neck, dripping onto the sterile drapes. "Ten seconds to touchdown! Secure the lines! Prepare the gurney!"
The helicopter slammed down onto the rooftop helipad of Lurie Children’s Hospital with a concussive shudder that rattled my teeth.
The cargo door was thrown open.
The cold city wind roared into the cabin, carrying the scent of rain, exhaust, and the vast, indifferent city below.
A specialized pediatric surgical team swarmed the aircraft, lifting the heavy transport incubator onto a rolling hydraulic gurney, moving with the terrifying, synchronized speed of people who fight death for an hourly wage.
They sprinted through the rooftop airlock toward the dedicated trauma elevators.
I ran beside them, my hand never leaving the cold acrylic glass of the incubator, my eyes locked on the tiny rise and fall of my son’s chest.
As the elevator doors were closing, the chief pediatric surgeon—a tall man with silver hair and an iron jaw—placed both hands on my chest, holding me outside the car.
"Operating Room 4, Mr. Pike," he said, his voice completely calm amidst the storm. "You wait in the private family alcove on the twelfth floor."
"I need to be in there," I choked out, fighting against his grip. "He needs to know someone is with him—"
"If you are in that room, you are in my way," the surgeon said, his gray eyes pinning me to the floor. "And if I am distracted for half a second, your son dies. Wait for me on twelve."
The elevator doors slid shut with a dull, hydraulic hiss.
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The indicator lights began their descent: 24... 22... 20...
I stood alone in the concrete airlock, the wind howling across the wet tarmac behind me, my hands covered in the dried, flaking blood of a child I had never known.
